Howard Zinn (1922-2010)

Howard Zinn was born in 1922 in Brooklyn, New York, into a working-class family and, though he had few formal educational opportunities, he developed a strong social consciousness while working as a shipfitter and avidly reading the novels of Charles Dickens. Flying bombing missions in World War II shaped his opposition to war. After military service he earned a doctorate in history at Columbia University and taught at Spelman College in Georgia where he was active in the Civil Rights movement. In 1963 he moved to Boston University and became a prominent, outspoken critic of the Vietnam War.

Best known for his A People's History of the United States: 1492-Present (1980, revised 1995), a history of America through the perspective of “those outside of the political and economic establishment,” Zinn remained an active advocate for the underclass, a proponent of world peace and an articulate critic of corporate power and greed supported by governmental collusion.